Iranian Elections & Nukes

We know Iran’s elections are still two weeks out, but where it counts – Iran’s threat to global peace and security – it’s already a done deal. They’re not interested in negotiations, and the ballot box isn’t going to change that. Regrets to the overly optimistic.

Exhibit A: Nuclear negotiator Jalili likes to emphasize his opposition to “nuclear retreat” and stress that Iran is standing up to “oppressive powers” that have “surrendered.”

If he loses the election, we’d love to be a fly on the wall at his next meeting with Lady Ashton, to see the look on the face of Wendy Sherman and the rest of her P5+1 counterparts from the “oppressive powers” (he’s including Russia and China, no?).

Exhibit B: The others. As pointed out by RAND analyst Alireza Nader, the eight dwarfs are competing for the favors of their Snow White: Khamenei. Just look at them: Rouhani, who admitted to deceiving his interlocutors and exploiting diplomacy to advance nuclear technology; Rezai, former head of IRGC and wanted by INTERPOL for the AMIA bombing; and Velayati, timeless Khamenei caddy also implicated for AMIA.

Ghalibaf and Soleimani probably roomed together at IRGC cadet school or something.

Exhibit C: One of the guys really calling the shouts, head of Iran’s nuclear organization Fereydoun Abbasi Davani, just made it crystal clear: “Definitely the result of the presidential election will not have any influence on the nuclear issue.”

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[…] not just Israel. Perhaps the Iranians’ progress in the plutonium route, as well as aggressive nuclear rhetoric coming out of their elections campaign, have clarified to many that diplomacy without a coercive […]